Our original goal with this blog was to keep people up to date with some of the production details from various projects.  What we are using for cameras, how we are shooting certain things, who is inspiring us and so on.  Over the course of 2008, the Eastern Horizons blog and The Range Life ate up all of our blogging hours and we neglected to develop this portion of the website.  Hence the last post being from almost a year ago this time!  So…added to the ever growing list of 2009 New Year’s resolutions is pumping time into the development of "production stories" for this page.  We are always trying to find unique ways to capture the kayaking stoke, so here are a couple of things to get this rolling.

Knowing that I would be absent the likes of Phil Tifo, Todd Gillman and Steve Rogers on the Eastern Horizons tour, I invested in a few pieces of Canon L series glass this year.  With the exception of having Phil for the first leg in Newfoundland, Lise-Anne and I had to juggle capturing some still images while shooting the film.  It proved challenging, but towards the end of the trip I really started to enjoy working with the still medium.  No sound to deal with, smaller package of equipment, ect… Here are two of my favorite images and a little info about how I managed to pull them off.

This first shot was by far my favorite from the entire trip.  It was also created by a rare set of circumstances and came together in a matter of seconds when I was least expecting it.  It was shot in the Magdalen Islands early July.

This shot turned out so well for a couple of reasons.  Obviously an amazing spot.  Apparently the hole in the ceiling had just eroded this past winter.  We had no idea that this room existed when we entered the cave and probably would not had even continued had it not been for a small zodiac we saw come out from the entrance.  For the first couple of minutes we both sat under the opening saying "wow" over and over.  While I did not realize it at first, the exhaust from the outboard was what was causing the shaft of light to be so prominent.  I immediately got out of my boat and tucked myself back into the furthest corner of the cave.  With my wide lens all the way wide I could just squeeze the scene into a vertical.  In a matter of minutes the beam of light disappeared.  Still amazing, but it would have never produced a photo like this.

This second photo is not a bing, bang, boom kayak action shot, but it captures for me the mood of being out on the sea.  This was taken off the coast of Maine in June.

Nothing super special to share on this one.  I just had to wait for the fog to clear my foreground so I could get John and Lise-Anne crisp and then work with the fog in the background for the depth of field.  The body language seemed to work as well.  The thermos of tea is out, it has been a long day on the sea and they seem quite content with the porch of this rustic cabin.

Next post will include some beta on the new Sony EX-1 we have started to shoot on…